On November 30, 2022, retired Suffolk County Judge Stuart Namm passed away at the age of 89.

As UJPLI has long noted, driven by concern over a pattern of misconduct by Suffolk County Police Department homicide detectives and Suffolk County District Attorney’s prosecutors, including possible perjury by prosecutors he observed while presiding over criminal cases, Judge Namm persuaded then-Governor Mario Cuomo to direct an investigation of SCPD and the Suffolk DA’s office by the Temporary Commission of Investigation of the State of New York. The commission’s investigation found evidence of material misfeasance and malfeasance by both SCPD and the DA’s office.  As a result of the investigation, the police commissioner resigned, the district attorney elected not to run for re-election and several officers were resigned or retired early. Notably, none of those involved faced criminal penalty for their misconduct.

Sadly, it was Judge Namm who paid the dearest price. He was transferred to a different court handling civil cases.  His car was keyed.  He was hissed and snubbed at public gatherings.  And in 1992, the head of the Suffolk County Democratic Party, Namm’s former law practice partner, refused to back him for renomination to the bench and would not take or return his calls.  According to his son, Gary Namm, "To the day he died, it still broke his heart."  Judge Namm suffered financial loss as well.  He was forced from office just three years shy of the minimum twenty years needed to qualify for a state pension.  He retired to North Carolina where his wife of 46 years died of a massive heart attack in 1996.    

Judge Namm remained committed to justice.  He invested about $100,000 of his life savings to produce the 1998 documentary Martin (Marty) Tankleff; “A Question of Guilt” (YouTube video) about the case of Martin Tankleff, who, in 1988, at the age of 17, was wrongly convicted of murdering his parents, Arlene and Seymour Tankleff, and served 17 years of a 50-years to life prison sentence.  Ironically, the 1989 report of the Temporary State Investigative Committee’s investigation, which Judge Namm initiated, found that the lead Detective in the Tankleff case, James McReady, had perjured himself on the stand in a murder case three years before the Tankleff murders.  Subsequent investigation implicated Seymour Tankleff’s business partner, Jerry Steuerman.  A member of Tom Spota’s law firm had previously represented Steuerman in a case related to the sale of cocaine out of the business.  In 2004, a wholesaler testified that he frequently saw Detective James McReady and Jerry Steuerman together in the store in the 1970s and early 1980s. Between 2004 and 2007, SCPD Lieutenant Raymond F. Smith communicated with former federal prosecutor and CNN legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin. That communication included an emailed ‘tip’ that Detective McReady may have helped plan the Tankleff murders and orchestrate a cover-up. With advocacy by The Innocence Project, Martin Tankleff was released from prison in 2008 and his wrongful conviction was overturned.  Suffolk County later paid $10 million to settle the resulting civil suit.  Martin Tankleff went on to become an attorney, who advocates for the wrongly convicted, and a visiting professor at Georgetown University.

Weeks after moving to North Carolina, Judge Namm became the first recipient of the Justice Thurgood Marshall Award from the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers.  He received the David C Michaels Award from the New York State Bar Association.  He was also awarded an honorary life membership in the Long Island Region of the NAACP that came with an international clock that bears the inscription: “To someone who stood up for what was right at great personal sacrifice.  Principle . . . ahead of expediency.  A man who practiced and lived what everyone else preaches.” Judge Namm remarried and lived a full vigorous life in retirement. He won awards in competitive tennis, swimming and cycling and taught himself to tap dance competitively in his seventies. He is survived by a loving family that includes his wife, children and grandchildren.

Most recently, Suffolk County Executive Steve Bellone presented Judge Namm with the county's Distinguished Public Service Award at a Judicial Reform conference in June 2021 to recognize his significant contribution to the furtherance of justice in Suffolk. Following Judge Namm’s death, County Executive Bellone posted the following tribute on Facebook:

Suffolk County recently lost an exemplar of integrity and justice when former Supreme Court Judge Stuart Namm died on November 30th.

Judge Stuart Namm helped identify former DA Spota’s corruption years before he was ultimately exposed and sent to federal prison. Judge Namm’s example of integrity, courage and his commitment to justice exemplifies the ideal of what we should expect from our crucial third branch of government. His story also provides a compelling case for the need to reform the judicial selection process in the state of New York.

I was proud to present him with the Suffolk County Distinguished Public Service Award during our Judicial Reform conference in June 2021 in recognition of his significant contribution to the furtherance of justice in Suffolk County.

Judge Namm had four favorite Martin Luther King, Jr. quotes. The first has graced the banner of UJPLI’s website since its creation:

“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” The other 3:

• Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about the things that matter

• The time is always right to do what is right

• When we ask negroes to abide by the law, let us also declare that the white man does not abide by the law in the ghettos. Day in and day out he violates welfare laws to deprive the poor of their meager allotments.  He flagrantly violates building regulations and his police make a mockery of the law.

While it is beyond difficult to sum the value or meaning of any life, the words of Edward “Ted” Kennedy’s eulogy of his brother, Robert F. Kennedy, illuminate vital aspects of Stuart Namm’s life: 

He “need not be idealized, or enlarged in death beyond what he was in life, to be remembered simply as a good and decent man who saw wrong and tried to right it, saw suffering and tried to heal it.”  

We should long and well remember Stuart Namm and “pray that what he was . . . and what he wished for others will some day come to pass for all the world.”

May his recognition of and respect for the common humanity of others, his unflinching courage, his fundamental decency, his integrity, and his unwavering commitment to justice serve as a beacon and inspiration for others. 

May his memory be a blessing.

Whistleblower LI Judge Remembered For Suffolk Corruption Fight (msn.com)

Rooting out corruption cost judge his political career (starnewsonline.com)

A Whistleblower's Lament: The Perverted Pursuit of Justice in the State of New York by Stuart Namm

Judge Stuart Namm Speaks to NAACP on Martin Luther King Day - YouTube (1.19.04)

Stuart Namm Dances a Tribute to James Cagney and George M. C - YouTube